The single-window mode has finally been confirmed for Gimp 2.8. Peter Sikking, interface and interaction artist for the GIMP makes this very clear in a recent blog entry.

If you like the multi-window mode, fear not, Peter says that you will be able to switch between single and multi-window by using a menu switch:

Next, I reminded everyone that it is a fifty–fifty world: about 50% of GIMP users love the multi‐window interface of today and do not want to lose it, about 50% of GIMP users would love to move to a single‐window interface.

With the world fifty–fifty split, we will serve them with one switch in the Windows menu, switching between multi‐and single‐window mode.

But obviously, there would be lots of other improvements in Gimp 2.8, such as:

* Multiple column inspectors. You will be able to use more than one column for all the dialogs!!
* Switch between open images using an easy history thumbnail bar (no tabbing like web browsers or as it is in Photoshop currently). This is also more eye-friendly than tabs!
* Polaroid overlays. You can overlay the window to i.e. show multiple parts of an image in different zooms.

Please note: the image in the beginning of this post and on Peter Sikking's website are not real Gimp 2.8 pictures, but mock-ups. They just give you an idea of what Gimp 2.8 could look.

If you want to install Gimp 2.7, a first step towards GIMP 2.8, the next stable release (please note that this is an unstable development snapshot), here are installation instructions for: